Author 




Title 



Class E6..6-4.... 
BookJ)..4ll5fi. 



Imprint 



GPO 16 — 7461 



ADDRESSES 



SENATOR CHAUNCEY M. DEPEW 



\ 



DINNER GIVEN BY THE MONTAUK CLUB, OF 

BROOKLYN, ON SATURDAY EVENING, 

APRIL 21, 1900, IN CELEBRATION 

OF HIS BIRTHDAY 

AND AT 

GIRARD COLLEGE, MAY 19, 1900, AT THE CELEBRA- 
TION OF THE ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTIETH 
ANNIVERSARY OF THE BIRTH OF ITS 
FOUNDER, STEPHEN GIRARD 



WASHINGTON, D. C. 

JUDD & DETWEII.ER, PRINTERS 

1900 



« I., 4$. • 



r^-fc 






V 



At the Dinner Given by the Montauk Club, of Brooklyn, on Saturday 
Evening, April 21, 1900, in Celebration of His Birthday. 



Gentlp::men : For the ninth successive year you give me 
your hearty welcome and generous greeting on my birth- 
day. Your inspiring message has always been, " God bless 
you and good luck to you." In the kaleidoscope of the 
revolutions of time we have found something on each anni- 
versary in the experiences of the year which has intervened 
for discussion and reflection. The transition from private 
station to public life since we met here last April gives the 
thought for tonight. The differences between social life at 
the Capitol and in the metropolis and a view from the inside 
of the Senate as it is — and not as it is pictured — are perilous, 
but interesting subjects for the talk of this anniversary of 
1900. 

Society is a term of as wide range as civilization. The 
social world illustrated by the late Mr. Ward McAllister 
has neither touch nor interest in that which met for years 
at Parker's, in Boston, every week, with Longfellow, .James 
Russell Lowell, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Oliver Wendell 
Holmes, Whittier, and congenial friends at the table. The 
newspapers print news which their readers want, and the 
criticism of the paper should be directed against the sub- 
scriber. It is a singular commentary upon public curi- 
osity that one or more conspicuous columns in the press of 
large cities and of villages are filled with the doings of 



fashionable folks, while the feast of the gods at Parker's 
rarely receives a paragraph. One who travels much over 
the country finds in families which never liave met or seen, 
or ever expect to meet or see, the people in smart society in 
New York, Philadelphia, Boston, or Newport reading with 
avidity, to the exclusion of news about the war, the Govern- 
ment, or the markets, the descri})tions of dinners, dances, 
and dresses, and the names of hosts and guests. We have 
reversed the rule of classic days. AVhen Athens guided the 
thought and set the fashions for the ancient world, in the 
peculiar relations which women held to society at the 
Grecian capital, Aspasia established a salon. It is the first 
of which we have record, and in her parlors could be met 
all there was of distinction in war, letters, art, philosophy, 
or the stage, and all the reigning beauties. Apparently 
these gatherings and the balls and banquets received no 
public notice, while the dinners of Alcibiades and others, 
with Plato, Socrates, and the philosophers and orators as 
guests, were reported in full, and the conversations at these 
banquets have survived for the instruction and delight of 
succeeding generations for three thousand years. 

People are gregarious and love to meet each other to 
agreeably pass away time, some for mutual improvement 
and others for pleasure. Neither of these classes can criti- 
cise the other, and the world is large enough for all. The 
dancing set call the thinkers and workers bores and muffs, 
and the sages decr}^ the gay and happy crowd who chase 
the fleeting hours with flying feet as frivolers and fools- 
Both are wrong. Each group in its way is getting its share 
of the things which each believes makes life wortli the liv- 
ing. We have to recognize in recreation and pleasure, as 



we do in food and drink, that what is one person's meat is 
another's poison. The end to be attained is happiness, and 
the seeker is a success, whether he or she finds it by the head 
or the heels. 

The happiest men and women are those who are suffi- 
ciently broad, liberal, and cosmopolitan to be at home with 
the devotees of fashion, with authors, actors, artists, or poli- 
ticians, and can enjoy the freedom of Bohemia. 

The society of the national capitals is more interesting 
than that of great financial and commercial centers. On 
the other side of the sea, London, Paris, Berlin, Vienna, and 
Rome are conspicuous illustrations, and in America, Wash- 
ington. Government and governing and the rewards and 
honors of public life attract to the capital ambition, genius, 
and beauty. Political position and the official class, with 
their recognized precedence at both public and private 
functions, so level or lift, as you please to view it, social 
standar^ that brains and achievement are welcome at the 
most exclusive gatherings and receive honor and recogni- 
tion from those whose position is founded on ancestry or 
money. In elegance, refinement, and culture, the outward 
and visible forms of social life are the same in all large 
cities and fashionable summer resorts. The world of society 
in the city is closely built. 

The entrance is necessarily carefully guarded and creden- 
tials critically examined. There is a certain intimacy and 
camaraderie which calls for confidence and obligates the 
erection and maintenance of barriers against improper per- 
sons. The same people are continually meeting, and their 
interests become largely concentrated in each other. Social 
requirements occupy every hour of disposable time. Gen- 



eral reading or the study and discussion of current move- 
ments in religion, politics, art, literature, or science become 
impossible, talk about them stupid, and their representatives 
bores. I heard a charming New York social leader say, in 
the weariness of the close of a crowded season, " I wonder if 
it would be more lively and interesting to have with us some 
of the brightest literary freaks." 

At Washington the tremendous game of politics, national 
and international, draws in every one. All the residents, 
and strangers spending the winter at the capital, find them- 
selves suddenly having a deep interest in the cjuestions 
discussed in the Senate and House of Representatives and 
engaging the attention of the President and Cabinet. Cabi net 
ministers, ambassadors from foreign governments and their 
secretaries and attaches, Senators and Congressmen, army 
and navy ofhcers and accomplished under-secretaries, are met 
everywhere. The personal kaleidoscope is ever changing, 
and there is little talk about what people are doing. The 
subjects of conversation are rmj^ersonal and cover a wide 
range. Rough diamonds, rubbing against sympathy and 
understanding, become suddenly and exceptionally brilliant. 
A tactful host or neighbor discovers eloquent and enjoyable 
resources by starting a guest upon the deeds or ideas which 
have given him distinction. Every one reads so as to be up 
to date with the cabinet minister or ambassador or Senator 
or Congressman, and in reading and studying great ques- 
tions they find an unexpected field of pleasure and excite- 
ment. 

For those who are subject to mental labor, and, in a word, 
for all workers, relaxation is health for mind and body. 
Social pleasures soothe and rest the taxed brain and freshen 

4 



it for tomorrow's duties. A man or woman who cannot en- 
joy dining or meeting in any form of entertainment with 
friends and such strangers as they know about are unfortu- 
nately constituted. They are dissatisfied with tliemselves 
and disagreeable to others. 

Society, after all, is a sort of trust for mutual enjoyment. 
Every stockholder must contril)ute something to the general 
pleasure. Cynical sneers or platitudinous preachings have 
never affected it and never will. People want to be happj", 
and all forms of association and pleasant activity which are 
free from immorality or bad breeding are part of the good 
things which in various ways, adaptable to their years, 
smooth the pathway of life for childhood, youth, maturity, 
and old age. 

The cost of an entertainment has little to do with social 
enjoyment. Luxur}' is very good, if the host can afford it, 
but not necessary to a good time. I have found more pleasure 
in a two-dollar dinner at the Lotos club, when the lights of 
literature or the press were brilliantly scintillating, than in 
any number of ten-dollar ones. The most stupid and un- 
utterably boreous dinner I ever suffered through cost the 
giver thirty-six dollars a plate. I was at General Garfield's 
home, at Mentor, the day after Maine went Democratic. It 
was believe<l all over the country that this presaged the 
General's defeat for President. The fickleness of political 
worshippers had a fine illustration in his experience. From 
his nomination up to the day after the election in Maine 
his visitors numbered hundreds daily. That day no one 
came but two old Army comrades of the General's. The 
noonday dinner was a simple country meal of beefsteak, 
potatoes, and apple dumjdings ; but story, personal incident, 



and debate were memorably keen and bright. The General 
himself gave a word picture of the battle of Chickamauga 
which was the most realistic description of an historic 
struggle I have ever heard or read. When called to catch 
my train I found that at the General's table had sped three 
of the most enjoyable hours of my life. 

I remember sitting beside Browning one evening in London 
when hours seemed minutes. Six hours at dinner and the 
opera with Gladstone are to me an ever-living memory of a 
memorable night. Lincoln, Grant, Seward, Chase, Greeley, 
Raymond have each contributed to that enrichment of my 
life which I value more than any material accumulations. 
Kingsley, Holmes, Farrar, Lowell, and men and women of 
the lyric and dramatic stage have stamped upon my mind 
recollections as realistic and fascinating as the tales of the 
Arabian Nights in boyhood's memory. 

The Senate is constantly represented as the millionaire's 
club. The ])ersistent repetition of this statement has created 
a general impression that its membership is composed of men 
of large wealth. The reverse is the fact. There are ninety 
Senators. Ten of them, according to general belief, are worth 
more than a million of dollars. Ten more may be able to 
live upon the income of their accumulations. But more 
than three-fourths of the Senators have little or no property 
and no income beyond their salaries and what they can gain 
in addition by limited opportunities from their public duties 
for the practice of their professions, contributions to maga- 
zines, and other literary efforts. Many of them gave up 
years ago lucrative and rapidly increasing incomes from 
their professions /rom a profound sense of public duty and 
fondness for public life. They have reached their present 

6 



position and prominence by hard work and ability to do 
something better than their rivals. Industry has become a 
habit. There are conspicuous instances on both sides of 
Senators whose long service, familiarity with the needs of 
government, exhaustive labors upon public measures, inti- 
mate knowledge of the subjects before the Senate, and critical 
examinations of bills which get on the calendar make them 
invaluable, and their disappearance from the Senate would 
be a calamity. 

Fifty letters a day to be answered is a moderate corre- 
spondence, and committee and Senate duties fill the day. 
Senators, as a rule, are willing and anxious to oblige office- 
seekers. They know that many men prefer the government 
service to any other occupation, and others have earned 
recognition, if opportunity offers to gratify them, by work 
for the party ; but, Avith the civil-service examinations to 
contend with and the limited number of vacancies occurring, 
the difficulty of finding a position is very great. There are 
hundreds of applicants for each place, and behind each appli- 
cant a Senator and member of Congress, and the one who 
succeeds has simply won a prize in a lottery where all the 
rest draw blanks. Valuable time is often occupied by im- 
perious and importunate people who, instead of retaining 
an attorney, think their Senator should drop his public 
duties and prepare papers, briefs, bills, and gather testimony 
for their claims — a labor which would occupy a good lawyer 
days and weeks to accomplish. 

The statement has become common that the Senate has 
deteriorated since the days of Webster, Clay, and Calhoun. 
A careful comparison of the conditions then and now will 
demonstrate that this is not so. The Congress of their time 

7 



was legislating for thirty millions of people and tlie wants of 
a territory lying between the Atlantic ocean and the Rocky 
mountains, while the welfiire of seventy millions, the devel- 
opment and protection of a country of continental area, the 
governing of distant possessions and alien races, and complex 
international obligations, because of contact with the great 
powers and the need of markets for our increasing surplus, 
are the problems of today. 

The debate in both Houses of Congress upon the Phili})- 
pine and Porto Rican Cjuestions has been on as high a plane 
and shown as great ability as any of the famous historic 
discussions. In the days of Webster the congressional orator 
was the spokesman of his party, and furnished opinions 
both for the people and the paj^ers. He became a popular 
idol, and tradition always enlarges the proportions of an 
idol ; but now the newspapers are so cheap that every one 
reads several. They discuss and inform on all public ques- 
tions with fullness and authority. They give scant space to 
the debates in Congress, and they have greatly diminished 
the reputation and power of the speaker, no matter how 
eloquent he may be. AVith the exception of Webster's, 
none of the speeches of the idealized period of senatorial 
debate are read or can be read. The finish, style, literary 
quality, and scope of Webster will make his efforts American 
classics for all time. The methods of debate have changed 
in the Senate, as oratory has in the pulpit, at the bar, and 
on the platform. The preacher is now more direct and 
more practical than doctrinal. The lawyer has become 
careless and slipshod in order to be plain and conversational, 
and the sky-scraper who enchanted our ftithers is laughed 
off the platform. Careering among the stars, knocking out 



constellations, and strewing the floor with star-dust are 
memories of the barbaric amusements of a ruder age. 

The Senate is patient and long-suffering and will stand 
anything but eloquence. The Senator who has something 
to say and says it lucidly and incisively is sure of a respect- 
ful hearing, even if halting in speech and awkward in man- 
ner. It is the matter which is wanted, though preparation 
and the graces of good English, cultured style, and fine de- 
livery are appreciated. It is a most considerate body, and 
there is a continuing courtesy and deference to the wishes 
or the convenience of a Senator making a request, which is 
found in no other deliberative assembly. 

The election of Senators by the legislatures of the States, 
which was devised by the founders of our Government, so that 
the sovereign Commonwealths in the Union might be equal 
in the upper and the people represented directly in the lower 
house, subjects the candidate to selection by the members and 
senators of the State legislatures who are themselves the sur- 
vival of the fittest in their districts. No Senator is the acci- 
dent of a State convention sitting for one day, but must neces- 
sarily be a prominent and popular leader in his State to com- 
mand an election by the Legislature. The election of United 
States Senators by popular vote, instead of l)y the representa- 
tives of the people in the Legislatures of the States, would 
reverse the conditions which led to the adoption of the Con- 
stitution. In theory the candidates would be selected by the 
constituencies ; in practice the candidates would l)e nomi- 
nated by each party in its State convention. They would be 
part of the many names on the State ticket, and the choice 
the result of the concessions to localities and compromises ot 
factions which characterize conventions. The change is a 



revolution, and revolutions do not stand still. The enact- 
ment of a Federal election law which will secure to every 
citizen the suffrage and j)rotect him in its exercise is a 
necessary i3rereciuisite. The contests, which would be many, 
could not be decided for the possessor of the certificate of 
election or his opponent until the Senate was satisfied of an 
untrammeled vote and honest count for every citizen. 

The breaking down of the principle that in the Senate the 
States are equally represented in their sovereign capacity 
must lead in the end to the people and not the States being 
represented in the Senate, as in the House, and the member- 
ship of that body recast according to either population or the 
number of votes. New York State cast for President in 1896 
one million four hundred and twenty-three thousand eight 
hundred and seventy-six votes, and has two votes in the 
United States Senate. Nineteen States, with thirty-eight 
votes in the Senate, cast at the same election one million 
three hundred and seventy-four thousand five hundred and 
three votes. 

Contact with Senators soon reveals the special ability and 
characteristics which account for their importance at home 
and their presence in the Senate, and the more its ways and 
work are studied, the more the student will be convinced 
that the Senate of the United States is equal to the lofty posi- 
tion and imposing power which it holds in our Government. 

Well, gentlemen, I fear I have wearied you by these 
familiar confidences of my new experience. The philoso- 
phy of your greeting and my response is the happiness 
which is derived from broader opportunities for diversify- 
ing our careers and enriching our lives. The energy and 
ambition which carry us into other fields of endeavor is 

10 



strengthened by the effort, while the expanding intelhgence 
which comes from contact with as many sides as possible of 
the diversified world gives exquisite pleasure, prolongs life, 
and doubles and trebles each year by the good things which 
are enjoyed in it; so that at sixty we have, compared Avith 
the dullards and drones, equalled the ages of Methuselah 
and his cotemporaries. 

It may seem a grewsome thought, but many lessons are 
learned at funerals. My club, political, social, and business 
relations devolve on me a frequent necessity for attendance. 
I recall a man of many millions, whose career was concen- 
trated on accumulation. He was a power in his way, and 
its exercise was his sole enjoyment. The club, society, 
the festive gatherings where all are equal and human, and 
public activities knew him not. There were neither regrets 
nor tears at his grave. I heard his relatives discussing be- 
hind the backs of their mourning hands the extent of his 
wealth and its disposition, and the poor relation whispered 
to her neighbor while all heads were bowed in prayer : " I 
hope he has remembered all his family. He had such a 
lot." His life was mud. 

I tried in vain to check or guide a youth of large fortune 
who sought what he thought was pleasure in the excesses of 
every dissipation which money can buy, and was a physical, 
moral, and intellectual wreck before he learned that true 
pleasure leaves neither sting nor pain. I knew a genius 
whom God had endowed with the faculty for fame and large 
contributions to the happiness and knowledge of his fellow- 
men. He became the slave of drink. He squandered gifts 
of more value than the wealth of the world. Bankrupt in 
mind, in position, and in friends, he died as the fool dieth. 

u 



I stood beside a glorious good fellow in his last hours. He 
had been fairly successful in his profession, had filled public 
office creditably, and been a daring and brilliant soldier in 
the civil war, and won repeated promotions on the field of 
battle. He was the life of ever}- social gathering, and his 
mone}'', when he had any, and his time were at the service 
of the cause of patriotism or charity or the assistance of a 
friend in distress. At the el)b of the tide he left his friends 
this message : " The world owes me nothing. I have got out 
of life all there is in it." 

We all, I trust, reverently bow to the spiritual duties of 
life. But this occasion is not a pulpit. The work-a-day 
problems of rest and labor, of recreation with and in spite 
of worry and work, are the thought of this hour. After the 
peace of the little })rayer we learned and repeated at our 
mother's knee, and become children again in its nightly 
iteration, may we be able ere sleep comes, to face the world 
at the close of each day and say with my gallant friend, 
"Dear old world, you have treated me fair; you owe me 
nothino:. I have aot out of life all there is in it." 



12 



At Girard College, May 19, 1900, at the Celebration of the One Hundred and 
Fiftieth Anniversary of the Birth of its Founder, Stephen Girard. 



The civilization of antiquity, its art and literature, are as 
clear to us as the events of yesterday. The same cable 
which announces a battle on the Upper Nile records dis- 
coveries among the monuments near its delta which tell the 
story of dynasties ruling the country five and six thousand 
years before the Christian era. The social and intellectual 
life of Athens and Rome are as familiar to us as cotemporary 
reports in the press make that of London or Paris ; but we 
study little and are comparatively ignorant of the dark ages 
which followed, and the rise in the eighteenth century of 
civil and religious liberty. In the one hundred and fifty 
years from the birth of Stephen Girard until today are 
crowded nearly all of modern history worth preserving, 
and of human achievement which has uplifted the human 
race. The rights of the people and popular government 
were an academic discussion among French pliiloso})]iers to 
amuse a jaded aristocracy in 1750, the date of the birth of 
Stephen Girard at Bordeaux, France, and found expression 
in vague generalizations among a few patriots in the English 
colonies in America. As an enterprising and adventurous 
sailor during the first twenty-five years of his life, young 
Girard learned much of the greater privileges which pre- 
vailed in Great Britain, Holland, and America. He saw 
with clear vision the frightful conditions which existed in 
his own country. The tyranny, oppression and corruption 

13 



of the court and aristocracy, the denial of law or justice for 
the people, the grindint^ poverty, brutal ignorance and 
practical slavery of the masses became to his opened mind 
intolerable, and he cast his fortunes with the young Repub- 
lic of the West. 

The names he gave his first fleet of American merchant 
vessels reveal the mainsprings of his life and the develop- 
ment and fruition of this benefaction. From time immemo- 
rial ships have reflected in their titles the loves or the gods 
of their builders. More frequently they proudly carry over 
oceans and around the world the cherished names of wife or 
sweetheart, next of favorite heroes and then of places 
connected with boyhood memories. There is to the sailor a 
personality about his ship which belongs to no other inani- 
mate thing in any pursuit. She is his companion, his 
treasure, his safety and his home. Her speed, her move- 
ments, her idiosyncrasies, her varying temper in storm and 
calm, are to him a mystery and delight which find their 
counterpart only in the woman he adores. Stephen Girard 
had been from early boyhood on the seas as seaman and 
master. He was self-taught. He had l^ecome an American 
citizen during the most trying times of the AVar of the Revo- 
lution, and keenly appreciated his membership in the 
fortunes of the young Republic. He had a wife and child. 
He was an ardent patriot, a child of the church and devoted 
to his family. He was intensely proud of these new vessels, 
which, when launched, were the finest and fastest afloat. 
An ordinary man would have christened these pets from 
his home, from Washington and his compatriots, or from his 
birthplace at Bordeaux, or the scenes of his prosperity in 
Philadelphia. But this unimaginative "merchant and 

14 



mariner," as he describes himself in his will, called them 
respectively A^oltaire, Montesquieu, Rousseau and Helvetius. 

To his solid, broad-brimmed cotemporaries of the Quaker 
City, whose acquaintance with French literature was limited 
by ignorance, prejudice and aversion, this act was the freak 
of a Frenchman. It did not astonish them, because one of 
the favorite delusions of Americans has always been that 
frivolity and France are synonymous. The tremendous re- 
sults which had followed the teachings of the four philoso- 
phers of Girard's admiration and the French encyclo- 
pedists were familiar to him. He saw and experienced the 
practical effect of their principles in the liberty, happiness 
and increasing prosperity of himself and his fellow-citizens 
in his adopted country. Naturally his mind went back of 
the Declaration of Independence and the statesmen so famil- 
iar to him in their daily sessions at Liberty Hall to the 
works of Voltaire and Montesquieu. He regarded the 
fathers of the Republic as the pupils and disciples of his 
idols. 

The longer I live and observe, the more I am impressed 
with the little things which have revolutionized the world. 
Voltaire Avas the preeminent genius, the dominant intelli- 
gence of the eighteenth century. In his youth his brilliancy 
and wit made him a favorite with the nobility, who w^re 
amused by his conversation, but resented his familiarit3^ 
At a dinner at the Duke of Sully's, where were gathered the 
flower of French aristocracy, A'oltaire, as usual, was urged 
to talk. To these dissipated courtiers, wrapped in the divine 
right of birth, he Avas still only one of the people, and only 
superior to the rest of the common mass as a performing- 
monkey receives more consideration than his fellows. The 

15 



Clievalier de Roliaii, iiitemipting, said, ""AVho is this vouug 
man who speaks so loud ? " " He is," said VoUaire, " one who 
does not carry a great name, Ijut can do credit to the one he 
has." The Chevalier, in the superior rights and privileges 
which the nobles then had over the people, and from which 
genius was not exempt, had Voltaire beaten and nearly killed 
in the hallway l^y his retainers, and when A^oltaire recovered 
and challenged him to a duel, he caused him to be arrested 
and thrown into the Bastile. Such was the chivalry of the 
age of Louis XV, when mind was matched against heredity. 
This was one of the events wdiich changed the destiny of 
Europe. A^oltaire bent all the marvelous powers of his 
une(|ualed genius against state and church. The church 
survived, but throne and nobility were submerged in the 
French revolution. State and church condemned the ency- 
clopaedia of Diderot and his associates to be burned. A 
copy came into the possession of Madame de Pompadou]-. 
In a dispute at Versailles with the king and court one 
evening as to the composition of her rouge, she sent for 
her secreted copy of the encyclopaedia. There not only 
that but other ditficult matters were explained. At the 
entreaty of Pompadour, a royal decree permitted the publi- 
cation of the work. The intellect of France, enfranchised 
by the truths revealed in this monument of learning, was 
aroused to eager inquiry. It found guide and leadership in 
Voltaire, Montesquieu, Rousseau and Helvetius. The en- 
lightened people rose in revolt. They broke the cruel bonds 
which had so long enchained body, mind and soul. But 
in their fury over centuries of wrong they rushed into such 
excesses that from the rouge of the frail favorite grew the 
revolution which erected the guillotine and reddened the 



IG 



streets of Paris with the best blood of France. The princi- 
ple, policy and practice of feudalism divided the people into 
masters and serfs. The masses were the bearers of burdens, 
and the classes booted and spurred to ride them. The teach- 
ings of Girard's mentors were the rights of man. The}^ 
recognized and enforced the truths which JeflFerson con- 
densed into the immortal sentence, " that all men are created 
equal, that they are endowed, by their Creator, with certain 
unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the 
})ursuit of happiness." 

Stephen Girard settled in Philadelphia in May, 1776. 
His adventures on the sea had prospered and the mariner 
became a merchant. The world was before him for a home, 
but he deliberately risked his riches and cast his lot in the 
fiery furnace of the American Revolution. Concord, Lex- 
ington and Bunker Hill had become the stepping-stones of 
humanity in its upward march to liberty. ' Washington and 
his army were encamped in New York, and George HI and 
his cabinet were concentrating all the power and resources of 
Great Britain to crush the colonies. Two months later the 
ContinentalCongress, then in session within a stone's throw 
of Girard's new home, electrified America and Europe with 
the Declaration of Independence. 

For fifty-five years after this epoch-making document had 
created a new power and inaugurated the experiment of gov- 
ernment by the people under equal laws and equal rights, 
this merchant and mariner, this far-sighted man of busi- 
ness, keen observer and profound philosopher, grew with 
the growth and strengthened with the strength of the young 
Republic. He saw the country increasing in wealth by 
leaps and bounds, ^jike the born leaders of every period, 
2 17 



he earlier grasped the situation and more largely benefited 
by the marvelous results of the development of our resources 
under freedom, Init in less measure every citizen and every 
home was blessed. He was one of the first to recognize that, 
wliile monarchical governments rest upon class and priv- 
ilege, republics will live and prosper only as the people are 
intelligent. He was disgusted and alarmed by the Penn- 
sylvanian experiments with a common-scliool system and 
similar mistakes everywhere except in New England and 
New York. They reversed the principles of equality which 
he had so profoundly mastered. To the blind educators of 
our first quarter of a century the public school was the })au- 
pers' refuge. They claimed that the state could give educa- 
tion free only to those who declared their poverty and de- 
pendence. It required nearly fifty years of irritation and 
failure before the great truth triumphed that the first duty 
of free government is to give the opportunity for education 
with self-respect to all alike, to make the school-house as 
sacred as the home and to grant honor and applause to the 
boys and girls who avail themselves of the priceless oppor- 
tunities for usefulness, happiness and a career which knowl- 
edge and training bestow. 

At the age of eighty-one he was the most prosperous mer- 
chant, successful banker and wealthiest man in the United 
States. Six months before his death he executed his will. 
It exhibited his gratitude to his adopted country, and recog- 
nized that under its free institutions had been possible his 
remarkable career. It presented, at a time when such dis- 
positions of property were unknown, his mature judgment 
as to the uses of riches. It illustrated the working out in 
his mind of the teachings of his favorite authors, Voltaire, 

IS 



y 



•Montesquieu, Rousseau and Helvetius. The indissoluble 
connection of liberty and law, of the perpetuity of free gov- 
ernment and the equal rights of all with education were 
emphasized by the dedication of his fortune to the culture of 
intelligent citizenship. His purpose was grandly expressed 
by this declaration in his will : " I ^vould have them taught 
facts and things, l-ather than words or signs ; and especially 
I desire that by every proper means a pure attachment to 
our republican institutions, and to the sacred rights of con- 
science as guaranteed by our happy constitutions, shall be 
formed and fostered in the minds of the scholars." Girard 
College was builded upon this noble sentiment. For fifty- 
two years it has been the inspiration of its faculty and 
students. Over six thousand youths have graduated from 
it and entered upon the active duties of life. 

So thoroughly have the i)rinciples and precepts of the 
founder been imbedded in their plastic minds and charac- 
ters that ninety per cent, of them have succeeded in their 
various avocations and become useful and patriotic citizens. 
If it be true, as Bismarck said, tliat "one-third of the stu- 
dents of the German universities destroy themselves by 
dissipation, one-third wear themselves out by overwork, 
and the rest govern Euro})e," then the average of Girard is 
exceptionally high. They may not govern the state or 
nation, but as sovereign citizens their contribution is effect- 
ive. The educated are the leaders in every community of 
its public spirit, its humanitarian and religious work, its 
progress and reforms. 

Two classes of strong men influence the world. The one 
act upon impulse or are moved by the exigent necessities of 
the day ; the other build upon the basic principles which 

]9 



control in the end, though it may take years for them to- 
work out, and then the heneficent results go on forever. 
Stephen Girard was of the latter class. He studied his 
teachers in the long watches of his voyages. He tested and 
proved the truths they evolved, which were rocking thrones 
and elevating peoples, by the unexampled success of the 
American experiment in which he had acted an important 
part. So he saw far beyond his cotemporaries, and in his 
work he was a pioneer blazing a pathway for progress 
through the forests and jungles of ignorance and prejudice. 
It was clear to him that though the defective common- 
school system might grow with time to become nearly per- 
fect, yet it could never care for orphans who had lost parents 
and homes. We are all familiar with domestic tragedies 
where the bread-winner falls suddenh' in the fierce fight of 
modern competition, and in the confusion of his affairs all 
is lost and his young family cast adrift. His children must 
have support as well as education, the environment and 
safety of family influences as well as the lessons of the 
teacher, and the more enduring impressions which come by 
absorption from companionship and contact with people 
and things good or bad. 

And here comes in the admonition of the philosopher- 
philanthropist, as expressed in his will : " I would have 
them taught facts and things, rather than words and signs." 
He gave first a home, instinct with virtue and patriotism. 
It is possible for one-third of the youth in the universities 
of the old world to die from dissipation because their wealth 
and position leave no incentive to the ordinary mind for a 
career ; another third may fall from dissipation in unhealthy 
and unregulated study ; but the nobility of labor, the re- 

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wards of wisely directed work, the healthy spur of necessity, 
have been the favorable conditions of the Girard student 
and the Girard alumnus. 

When the founder died, higher education was thought 
necessary only for the liberal professions. It was said in de- 
rision of college training for practical affairs that anything 
beyond the " three R's," " readin," " ritin," and " rithmetic," 
distracted and s})oiled the business man. The country was 
then full of self-made men who proudly boasted of their 
ignorance of book learning. A college course for business 
is the product of the present generation, and manual train- 
ing has been adopted in few places and is slowly fighting its 
way to universal recognition. But this institution has been 
giving an enlarged curriculum and industrial education since 
the beginning under the directions of its far-sighted founder. 
The university was for centuries only for the priest ; then 
the lawyer was admitted and later the doctor. They ranked 
all other pursuits and led because of the opportunities and 
advantages of broader culture and more scientific training 
than their fellows. But invention and discovery have stim- 
ulated effort and necessitated preparation. " The journalist 
and the architect, the electrician and the engineer, the ed- 
ucated farmer and the learned blacksmith, the cultured 
teacher and the highly equipped executive of great corpo- 
rations and enterprises, demand the advantages and share 
the privileges of the learned professions. 

Stephen Girard was the first to begin and significantly 
enforce the duty of riches to the country which gives oppor- 
tunity for their accumulation. There were not then five 
men in the United States worth a million of dollars. His 
example has received the cordial and unanimous approval 

21 



of public opinion. It has taught the seltish that the safety 
of their accumulations depends upon their recognition of 
the fact that to a certain extent they are trustees and held 
accountable for the administration of the trust. It has 
pointed the way for the wise, generous, and benevolent for 
the most beneficial employment of their gifts. The secret 
is now a revealed truth, that philanthropy fails when it 
pauperizes and performs a grand work when it heli)s others 
to help themselves. 

From this source there now flows a contribution for 
schools, colleges, libraries, art, music, science and indus- 
trial education which amounts to thirty millions of dollars 
a year and is constantly increasing. B}^ Avise management 
the endowment of (lirard has grown from five to twenty-six 
millions, giving it an estate larger than that possessed by 
any university in the world. The founder in his invest- 
ments for the future of this college, as in his provision for 
its purposes, put his trust in the development of his countr}'. 
Surplus income from more and more productive mines and 
real estate adds to its endowment a million nearly a year. 
As the fund grows the benefaction embraces an enlarging 
number of pupils. The increase during the early years 
cared for hundreds in a sparse population, but it advances 
as the country fills up and will take under its fostering care 
and give the blessings of Girard for manhood and citizen- 
ship to thousands in the future. 

The wealth of Girard was the product of peace. Its ad- 
ministration recruits and disciplines workers for the industrial 
army which has placed the United States in the front rank 
among the powers of the world in all that constitutes a mighty 
nation and prosperous and happy people. Among the 



l-ofC. 



/ 



famous as warriors and statesmen, men of letters and enter- 
prise, builders and architects of States and institutions, whose 
lives cover the century and a half backward from today, this 
mariner and merchant is forging to the front. In one hun- 
dred and fifty years from today there will be gathered to 
celebrate the birth of the founder a multitude of living 
witnesses and honorable memories of those who have died, 
testifying to the work and worth of the college which sprang 
from his mind, was built by his beneficence, and expands by 
his endowment. America freely expresses her debt of grat- 
itude to her heroes and her statesmen, and gladly gives a 
day for equal appreciation to Stephen Girard, mariner and 
merchant. 



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